Recognized as a leader in her field by Chambers USA and as one of New Jersey's "Best 50 Women in Business" by NJBIZ, Sherilyn Pastor is Practice Group Leader of McCarter's Insurance Coverage Group. Her group provides legal assistance to corporate policyholders. She is also on the Firm's Executive Committee.
Ms. Pastor has secured hundreds of millions of dollars in insurance assets for a broad range of policyholder clients. She litigates complex coverage matters throughout the country and provides insurance coverage advice to clients assessing their potential risks, analyzing new insurance products and considering the adequacy of their programs. Ms. Pastor is recognized in The International Who's Who of Insurance & Reinsurance (2010), and has been honored as a New Jersey Super Lawyer since 2005. She was a TWINS honoree in 2011.
Ms. Pastor is, for example, Transamerica Corporation's lead trial counsel in a dispute with a former subsidiary regarding insurance Transamerica purchased as part of a consolidated risk management structure for itself and its subsidiaries. After a several month trial for this large, multi-national corporate policyholder, Ms. Pastor secured a very favorable ruling that Transamerica had no implied contract with the former subsidiary by virtue of its consolidated risk management approach. In addition to soundly rejecting the former subsidiary's claims in a detailed and thoughtful opinion, the trial court granted Transamerica's request for declaratory and other relief against the subsidiary.
Ms. Pastor obtained summary judgment awarding Wakefern Food Corporation insurance for all its 2003 Northeast blackout losses. She assisted Lucent Technologies Inc. (now Alcatel Lucent) to recover its fiduciary liability coverage following various class action settlements with ERISA plaintiffs.
Ms. Pastor serves on the Editorial Boards of the Insurance Coverage Law Bulletin, and is a consultant on the New Appleman Insurance Law Practice Guide. She is the current Chair (Policyholder Side) of the ABA Litigation Section’s Insurance Coverage Litigation Committee for 2012-2013. She served as Vice-Chair (Policyholder Side) of the ABA Litigation Section’s Insurance Coverage Litigation Committee from 2009-2012, and has been co-chair of various ABA’s Insurance Coverage Committees since 2002. She is a member of the New Jersey Supreme Court’s Professional Responsibility Rules Committee. Ms. Pastor teaches programs for the National Institute for Trial Advocacy, and she also publishes and lectures frequently on insurance, trial skills and ethics matters. She recently offered ethics seminars for the New Jersey Law Journal and a Strafford interactive webinar on Insurer's Duty to Defend.